Amelia Earhart

Due to the wide range of ability levels my classroom serves there are many different levels of behavior management. Depending on the level of understanding of your child will depend on what system I will use with them. It would be helpful to know what system you use to manage behavior at home since many respond to discipline in different ways. Some students do well with positive reinforcement systems where they earn fun activities while others do better with a negative reinforcement system that might involve losing privileges.

My classroom will have the following general rules: Be Safe, Be Nice, Do your work. Lots of situations can be linked back to those three rules. I go over the rules and visually present them so that students can see them throughout the school day. If students understand what these rules are then I generally refer back to the visuals when they are breaking a rule (for example if a student is running in the hallway then I will refer back to it’s not safe to run in the hallway).

I also use a happy/sad motivational system in the classroom. If students are working well and doing a good job then they are in turn making “happy choices”. If students are not following those general rules then we might indicate they are making “sad choices”.

If students make “sad choices” then I have a “sad/no spot” for them in the classroom acting as a “time out” place. When students have taken a min or two to think about their actions or calm down we will ask if they are ready to return to their work area or activity. If they are ready we will return, if not we will take more time to cool down. I will always encourage them to return to the activity we were doing prior to the behavior so they understand that task completion is expected. The work upon returning to the area might be modified or reduced in order for students to be successful.

Generally after the 1^st week of school I will be able to gage what system will work best for them. Some students might be carrying with them a schedule of daily activities including some pictures of motivators that they might be working for throughout the day. I will be sure to review your child’s system with you during our 1^st conference in September.